The paper linked above published just a few days ago in the Elsevier journal Technological Forecasting and Social Change makes a point that climate policy still too often avoids, there will be no serious transition to a low-carbon economy while circular economy, innovation policy and climate mitigation continue to operate in separate institutional silos. The authors use the Quintuple Helix Model to show that meaningful eco-innovation depends on the coordinated action of companies, governments, universities, society and the natural environment.
Their argument goes beyond recycling and resource efficiency. What is required is a regenerative economic model in which innovation in energy, construction, transport, manufacturing and waste is deliberately directed toward climate goals. The implication is uncomfortable but important: the technological solutions may already exist, while the real failure lies in our inability to coordinate institutions around them. Circularity cannot remain an environmental side project. It must become part of the architecture of climate policy itself.
